Occasional blog posts about social and political issues from a left-of-centre perspective by Martyn Sloman.

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The battle for the Labour Party is over for the time being. Supporters of Jeremy Corbyn have won: he has been re-elected as leader and will be in place until the next general election; our party here in North Norfolk has been captured by his supporters. An inevitable consequence, at least in the short-term, is that the Labour Party will cease to become a potential party of government. It will be incapable of achieving change through democratic means by winning elections and will degenerate into a mere protest group,

For many us who were brought up a tradition that saw the Party as the best way of achieving social justice, this is a sad conclusion. These are depressing times. The question is whether the situation is irreversible and if so how. I have little doubt that, at some stage, new voices will emerge, and that they will offer radical economic and social alternatives that extend beyond slogans and soundbites. It is uncertain whether such voices will be based in the Labour Party or come from an entirely different political tradition and background.

This is an issue that I discuss over the occasional lunch with a friend who teaches at the University of East Anglia. He, like myself, is a long-standing party member and we were both asked to allow our names to go forward for the list of candidates in the next set of County Council elections, due to take place in May. Standing would amount to no more than a gesture: there is absolutely no prospect, in the current climate, of winning in our part of North Norfolk. In a previous blog I drew attention to a local District Council bye-election that took place at the end of September (http://wp.me/p5dTrr-cH). Labour polled 23 votes. 10 people signed the nomination papers and both I and a member of my family voted Labour. That means that only 11 others out of an electorate of 1800 gave the Party their vote – despite energetic leafleting in the area. It could hardly be worse.

The question is what should we do. Let me quote from my friend’s response to the invitation he received:

I do not wish to put myself forward as a candidate. To do so would be to ask voters to support also the current leader of the party, his ill-conceived ideas and the entryists and anti-Semites who thrive under his leadership. … I cannot publicly support the Labour party for as long as Jeremy Corbyn remains its leader, nor will I support the party either through donations or by giving advice, as I have done in the past. I very much hope that there will come a time, and soon, when I will be able to resume an active role in the Labour party again

I entirely agree with his position and would emphasise his last sentence. Once there are indications that the Labour Party is ready to become the basis of a credible social-democratic alternative to the market fundamentalism of the current government, I will again give it time and money. The good news is that there are now some indications that this could happen. Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London is a principled, capable and articulate politician who is building his own power-base; Hilary Benn and Yvette Cooper have taken on the Chairs of two important Select Committees of the House of Commons; Keir Starmer, a lawyer with enormous intellectual strengths, has accepted a role in the Shadow Cabinet and will provide the necessary and overdue challenge on Brexit.

Who knows, within a year or two it might be time to start going to the meetings to support such people. My guess is that many of those currently in control locally with have lost interest by then.

Jeremy Corbyn has followed his re-election with a Shadow Cabinet reshuffle, promoting his allies. Now he has to deliver.

His position reminds me of a joke by the 1930s comedian Will Hay, when playing an incompetent schoolmaster in one of his films. ‘Boy, go the bottom of the class. Sir, I am at the bottom of the class. Well go to the top of the class and remember you’re a lap behind.’

In future these blogs will appear on a monthly, rather than a weekly, basis. I will be writing on the challenge facing the centre-left in developing a credible alternative.

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Once I had recovered from my immediate depression following the Labour Party Conference I checked out the on-line site of our local newspaper, the Eastern Daily Press. Their politics page included a picture of local Corbyn supporters enjoying their triumph: ‘Jubliant (stet) Corbyn supporters and Momentum members celebrated the long-expected victory over challenger Owen Smith at a Norwich pub and called for unity behind the leader’. http://www.edp24.co.uk/news/politics/local_corbyn_supporters_call_for_unity_after_landslide_victory_1_4710124

The joint secretary of my local North Norfolk Labour Party was amongst those present and, it is reported, offered the following observation: ‘He (Jeremy Corbyn) has started uniting the party in his speech today by holding out an olive branch and reminding us we are all part of the same family. There are disagreements but we are together above all else’. Well Sue, I take a different view; I’m not sure we have much in common. Indeed the reference to ‘part of the same family’ reminds me of an occasion when my mother was talking to one of my many Aunts about the Aunt’s 20 year-old daughter. My Aunt reported: “Susan and Jason (not their real names) are rowing with each other all the time. They’re going to have to get it sorted out because they’re getting engaged at Christmas”. They did indeed get engaged at Christmas, had a big wedding the following year, and divorced two years later.

Where real differences exist it takes more than an engagement ring or bland calls for unity to resolve them.

Our North Norfolk Labour Party is now firmly in the hands of the Corbyn supporters and it is down to them to deliver. They are not off to a good start – see my blog on the Glaven Valley bye-election http://wp.me/p5dTrr-cH – but in fairness they must be given time. It is evident that Jeremy Corbyn is unassailable as leader this side of a General Election and the first test here will be whether the Party advances or retreats in the County Council elections due in May 2017.

I have been a candidate (in hopeless seats) the last two occasions these elections were contested but will not put my name forward this time round. I cannot, in all integrity, commend Corbyn’s 1980s style social protest movement to the electorate. Neither, for the time being, will I go to the local meetings. In 50 years of political activism I have yet to attend a meeting of the Labour Party where anyone ever changed his or her mind as a result of any discussion that took place there. I doubt that it will be any difference over the next year.

At a national level I will be seeking to contribute to the revival of sensible centre-left politics, and reporting on progress. I will, of course, remain a party member in the hope that the Labour Party will be the seedbed of such a recovery.

From now on my blogs will appear on a monthly, rather than a weekly, basis. I will try to look for something positive to say, which may not be easy – hence the reduction in output.

To receive email notification of the next blog when it appears, press the ‘followleftyoldman’ button on the left hand side above.

One consequence of the Corbyn leadership victory is that the intricate over-analysis of any election result, however trivial or untypical, will continue. Those who support the new model Labour Party are keen to demonstrate that Jeremy Corbyn is an electoral asset; more grounded left-of-centre supporters know him to be an electoral liability.

As chance would have it a first public test following the Liverpool coronation of the new leader has, in fact, taken place in my remote corner of North Norfolk. On Thursday September 29th some 1800 electors in Glaven Valley voted for a new councillor to replace the previous incumbent Liberal-Democrat who has moved to London.

The last time the position was contested, in May 2015, I was the Labour candidate: I polled derisory 78 votes coming fourth coming behind UKIP and just above the Greens. This humiliation was no surprise to me. Our area mainly consists of retired people, most but not all of whom are comfortably off. This time round the Conservatives chose a somewhat unusual candidate for the area. To quote from his election address: ‘I once won a Porsche 911 Car in a beer competition beating 17,000 others!’ and ‘I have appeared on game shows, most notably “Blind Date” beating odds of 1000-1’. By contrast the Lib-Dem was carefully understated, claiming only to have been ‘Senior advisor across the Civil Service under David Cameron, Gordon Brown and Tony Blair’.

I declined the opportunity to fight again – and clearly would have been out of my depth against such august opponents. Moreover I have decided that I cannot publicly support and campaign for the Labour Party while Jeremy Corbyn is leader. I remain a committed member in the hope of better times.

Given the capture of our local Labour Party by the pro-Corbyn faction I had assumed that one of them would be keen to put their views to the test at the polling station. After all our membership has increased from 170 to over 600. However none of those in our ward attended the selection meeting and our constituency Chairman, who lives some 50 minutes away in this vast constituency, agreed to stand. I know him to be of a more traditional persuasion, politically experienced, and with considerable personal charm. His election literature avoided all mention of our new leader. When he called he assured my wife and I that he was concentrating on local issues and receiving a good response on the doorstep.

On election day (September 29th) the Lib-Dem candidate sent out an early morning e-mail that stated ‘The election today is likely to be the closest in this area for many years – probably within a few dozen votes’. I cannot believe she had any basis for making such a claim but honesty does not figure highly among LibDem considerations. Their tactic locally is to say anything that might squeeze the Labour vote. In the event she polled 429 and had a majority of 148 over the Conservative.

Labour polled 23 votes – just under 3% of the total votes cast. My estimate is that this figure will be very close to the number of people in Glaven Valley who signed up (as members, affiliates or registered supporters) to vote in the Labour Party Leadership election. This is the lowest vote we have recorded in a District Council Election in North Norfolk this century. It does not bode well.

Writing a blog is a useful way of venting my frustrations. I don’t delude myself that I am influencing the national debate; I am not a figure of importance and my readership, while welcome, is hardly likely to mobilise into action.

I get occasional bits of feedback from readers. Most of this is welcome but one set of communications was both puzzling and disappointing. Over the last months I have received two formal complaints: one from the Secretary and one from the Chair of the North Norfolk Labour Party. To quote from one of the e-mails: ‘We would ask that you refrain from posting blogs that appear to make the meetings and processes of the local party unsafe for party members. In addition, we would ask that you consider removing those blog posts that refer to internal processes of the local party”.

My reaction on receiving this was to feel flattered (not only was I being read but my words were having some impact) had it not been for the implication that I am in some way threatening the idea that members should feel safe in local meetings. This I find offensive – particularly in the context of the Internet bullying and the jeering of Owen Smith that has characterized the leadership election to date.

The North Norfolk Labour Party has attracted some veterans from Labour’s civil war of thirty years ago, some of whom who have recently defected from the Greens. I suppose that, at 70, I must also be classed as a veteran Given all this, the major threat to personal safety at most Labour Party meetings, dominated as they now are by the Corbynistas, is for someone to fall off their chair. This would be a result of drifting into a doze induced by the boredom of listening to endless retro-slogans from the 1980s. However, since it appears that my presence and reporting could constitute a safety hazard, I have decided it best not to attend for the time being.

Many 60 and 70 year olds are antipathetic towards social networking: we feel that it can easily become a substitute for face-to-face social interaction. I well remember my wife’s reaction when a group of teenagers arrived for a birthday celebration at a Westminster pizza restaurant where we were eating. They sat on opposite seats of a long table and, rather than speak to each other about their experiences, brought out their smartphones and entered their digital world.

Now I recognise that this opinion is simply one of generational prejudice. The teenagers had every right to behave in this way if they wished – but I still feel they are missing out on something.

I have found myself displaying my generational prejudice in the local Labour Party. A number of members have contacted the party through our Facebook site asking if we are committing to support Jeremy Corbyn in the leadership tussle. These are members, affiliates or registered supporters (see what a mess we are in) who have had no previous contact with the party as far as we can recall. Some of us have pointed to their lack of activity. Foolishly I myself made a Facebook post to this effect and received the response that, just because people do nothing in campaigns, they have every right to their opinion. Although I find this a depressing response to receive from a much younger person I cannot deny the legitimacy of this point of view.

It does however rankle with the old guard who, over many years, have struggled to ensure that that nomination papers were signed and submitted and elections fought. In North Norfolk we have over 600 people who are registered as Labour supporters in one form or another and are able to cast their vote in the Labour Party Leadership Election. However it was the same small handful of long-standing members who were out on the streets in the Referendum campaign, showing a commitment in what was rightly described as the most important ballot in a generation. All credit therefore to my resilient colleagues for their stubborn determination.

Since the majority of our new members have been wholly inactive and the Labour Party must face the facts. If our constituency is anything to go by, we have not recruited whole swathes of young people who are about to regenerate left of centre politics. If that had been the case they would have been visible in the Remain campaign, where it is the under 35s who have produced the highest proportion in favour. Instead the Party has, as a result of a whole range of factors, acquired large numbers of Clicktivists: people who are supporters of Jeremy Corbyn and will take advantage of social media to maintain his position. They will click the mouse on their computer but do nothing beyond that. This will create a social protest movement that does little beyond waving the odd banner when what is needed is a commitment to change through winning elections.

Those of us who are international in outlook are waking up in a shattered state this morning. We cannot deny the result and must ask ourselves what sort of society we are living in and what our response should be. An unnecessary and exhausting Referendum campaign has been conducted in a thoroughly unpleasant fashion; I have never witnessed such overt racism and xenophobia as I did yesterday morning when handing out Remain leaflets at White Hart Lane station in North London.

We need to lick our wounds and take time to digest the lessons. However one thing is certain. We have reached a turning point in national politics: voting habits based on social class have ended for good.

I became active in politics as a teenager in my native city of Cardiff. Our family allegiance was firmly Labour and I was excited by the vision of the future that Harold Wilson offered – ‘the white heat of the technological revolution’. In Cardiff, like every provincial city, social class determined voting and housing was the most visible indicator. Posh Penylan and Llandaff voted Tory; the large council estates at the fringes of the city voted Labour. There were small enclaves of council housing in most of the wards and the assumption was that they would always produce Labour votes. Accordingly the practice was to knock up these houses on election evening to ensure that they voted; if you had the energy and resources you would have canvassed them previously to weed out the odd Conservative.

This practice worked in reverse. Over time our family circumstances improved and we became owner-occupiers living in a semi-detached house at the edge of the large Ely council estate. My father was in the front garden when a woman canvassing for the Conservatives called. Unusually for him he was polite and told her that he would be voting Labour. She responded with a snooty ‘What Labour? in a nice house like this’ causing him to explode. Ironically his class-based assumptions of politics were as strong as hers.

Before I went to help in London I participated in our Remain campaign here in North Norfolk. Together with my friend Mike Gates, the former Party Secretary, I delivered door to door in an area of social housing in the coastal town of Wells. He is well known and well liked locally so we encountered no hostility when delivering the Remain literature. It was easy work but I must now question whether our activity did any good – we may have helped to bring out the opposition. It now seems that it is ‘traditional Labour voters’ who have been the most hostile to the Party’s position. The divide has been between the wider outlook of the younger, better-educated, generation and those who lack confidence in a more international future. Times have indeed changed and so must the centre-left’s approach to politics.